Cons: Thick bezels around the screen, android navigation buttons are not backlit, not meant for gaming, lots of preloaded bloatware, lacks fast charge support

Intex has kept a sharp focus on the budget and mid-range smartphone segments. The Aqua Lions 3 from Intex is aimed at users who want a compact phone with big battery at an entry-level price.

At 162 grams, the Lions 3 is heavy for a 5-inch smartphone. The reason for this is not a metal body but the 4,000mAh battery. Thanks to the big battery and Android 7.0’s battery optimization, the Lions 3 easily delivers over a day and a half of battery life. However, keep in mind that this is a budget phone — which means no fast charging. It takes almost 5 hours to get a full charge on the phone.

Other specifications include a quad core Mediatek MT6737 processor, 2GB RAM and 16GB internal storage. This is fairly common fare on devices at this price. It’s still capable of delivering an acceptable usage experience. Overall navigation is zippy and switching between running apps is also seamless as long as there aren’t too many apps in the background.

As for gaming, its best to stick to basic ones like Candy Crush.

Anything else and you will notice frame drops and lags. One good thing is that you get a dedicated microSD slot for expansion and it supports up to 128GB cards.

The display is 5-inch IPS unit with a resolution of 1280 x 720 pixels. We liked the screen’s high brightness and rich colour but the thick bezels on all four sides are a turn-off. Also, the screen is a fingerprint and smudge magnet.

Under the screen are the three Android navigation buttons and like most phones in this price range, they are not backlit. We liked the brushed metal finish on the back of the phone — it offers a premium appearance even though it is a plastic panel.

The rear panel is removable and underneath it you’ll see the dual SIM slots, microSD slot and nonremovable battery. It would be nice to see a fingerprint scanner for security but it’s probably too much to ask for at this price.

Cameras are the surprising factor on the Lions 3. Both cameras are 8MP and offer surprisingly good results for the price. In daylight, both cameras were able to take pictures with natural colour and a good amount of detail. Indoors, the images are soft but still good enough to view on screen and share on social media.

Most phones in this price range have terribly noisy cameras so Lions 3 needs praise for this. One issue is that the rear camera has a 1 second shutter delay in low light which often leads to blurred images. That being said, the Redmi 4 still has a much better camera in the same price range.

The Aqua Lions 3 comes with Android 7.0, but there is no information on any software update for the device. Intex has kept the interface close to stock but preloaded a number of bloatware apps — there are 12 preloaded apps and half of them cannot be uninstalled.

Overall, the Aqua Lions 3 does score on its battery and camera, but faces tough competition from the Redmi 4. The Redmi 4 for the same price offers an octa core Snapdragon 435 processor, a superior 13MP rear camera, fingerprint scanner and fast charging support.

You can even consider the Kult Gladiator at Rs 6,999 — it offers a 5.5-inch HD screen, 3GB RAM, 32GB storage fingerprint sensor, MT6737 processor and a 4,000mAh battery.

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